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Bird From CRUNCHBASE: Scooter Higher, Ridesharing Grabs $1B More, And VCs Find Spice In Food Startups

This past week at Crunchbase News, we took a look at the thundering battle between two of China’s largest tech giants: Alibaba and Tencent. We also learned that SoftBank’s Vision Fund, which invested $865 million in Katerra, has a taste for infrastructure startups.

 

Life sciences company Benchling picked up a $14.5 million Series B to help researchers minimize busywork. On the street, Southeast Asia’s ridesharing company Grab scored up $1 billion from Toyota, and Bird may raise another $200 million as the scooter frenzy continues. Softbank led a $250 million Series D for cloud storage company Cohesity. Crypto also attracted large sums. Bitmain raised a $ 400 million “pre-IPO” round, while good news from the SEC didn’t generate the crypto rally some were hoping for.

Meanwhile, tech IPOs are in bloom this week. Unfortunately, for us, Adaptive Insights IPO is no more. The unicorn opted to join Workday in a $1.55 billion acquisition.

The VC world was equally restless this week. In Asia, 500 Startups’ Thailand-based venture firm 500 TukTuks targeted $20 million in capital, and Samsung NEXT fund is seeking investment opportunities in AI. True Ventures is also angling to raise $650 million across two new funds. And hey, maybe some of that money will make its way to food and cybersecurity startups.

Looking outside the bubble, Mary Ann Azevedo found out Utah is ranked 6th in the nation in per-capita venture dollar volume. We also dove into the WeWork’s latest financial results and took a look at startups aiming to help small business kill swipe fees. Finally, Crunchbase News published its first book review: Survival to Thrival: Building The Enterprise Startup. For CEOs of enterprise startups, this is the book you should be reading.

Fintech Startups Aim To Kill Swipe Fees On Behalf Of Small Business Owners

In 2017, the use of prepaid and private label cards accounted for $6.4 trillion in payments for goods and services. And while swiping or inserting a card may be the preferred way to pay for consumers, it’s at the literal expense of many merchants.

No More Minimums! →

VCs Serve Up A Large Helping Of Cash To Startups Disrupting Food

Startups in the food and beverage space gobbled up more than $3 billion globally in disclosed investment over the past twelve months. That includes a broad mix of supersize deals, tiny seed rounds, and everything in between.

We’ll Have Seconds, Plz →

Top Early-Stage Cybersecurity Rounds Of 2018 (So Far)

More than 25 early-stage, U.S.-based cybersecurity-adjacent startups have raised at least $10 million so far this year.

Not For Sale: Your Data →

It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad (Scooter) World

What has two wheels and might be worth two billion? Bird, oddly. And the company is looking to raise even more new capital.

Scooters Are Pricey →

As Thai Startups Rise, 500 TukTuks Tarkgets $20 Million For Second Fund

500 TukTuks, the Thailand-based branch of 500 Startups, filed paperwork with the SEC revealing plans for its second main fund.

Funding Thailand →

Survival To Thrival: When Product-Market Fit Isn’t Enough To Grow An Enterprise Startup

Survival to Thrival does what it says: explain the “hows” and “whys” of the company journey for enterprise-focused startups from formation to market domination.

To Read Or Not To Read? →

 

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